Inside the Artist-Run 'Secret Mall Apartment'
A new documentary tells the tale of how eight artists made a home out of Providence Place mall.
Summary
- A new documentary, titled Secret Mall Apartment, chronicles the story of a Rhode Island art collective that made Providence Place mall their home.
- Directed by Jeremy Workman and produced by Jesse Eisenberg, the film recently debuted at SXSW and has started rollout in theaters across the U.S.
Back in 2003, a group of Rhode Island artists transformed a forgotten corner of Providence Place mall into a secret 750-square-foot headquarters – now their story is hitting the big screen.
The group is the focus of a new documentary, Secret Mall Apartment, which made its debut at SXSW last spring. Directed by Jeremy Workman and produced by Jesse Eisenberg, the film centers around artist Michael Townsend, the “ringleader” of the covert operation, and the seven other members of the informal art collective, oscillating between archival footage and present-day interviews recounting what went down during their stay.
The project, formally known as Malllife, blurred the lines between installation, performance art and life, questioning the nature of public and private space and creating a home in the most unexpected places.
For years, the artists quietly inhabited the space in shifts, living out, as Workman noted, the childhood fantasy of living inside a mall. That dream came to an end when Townsend was discovered by a group of security guards in 2007, but their legacy lives on, captured in hours of grainy footage filmed on early 2000s Pentax cameras.
“No one was ever supposed to see that footage,” Townsend told The Washington Post. And yet, it’s exactly this raw, unfiltered glimpse into underground life that gives the film its cinematic flavor.
Secret Mall Apartment has started rollout in select theaters across the U.S. Head to the film’s website for more information on how to purchase tickets.
